On February 5-6, the Triangle Institute for Security Studies will hold a conference at the Friday Center in Chapel Hill on conflict in Africa. Our purpose is to gather a distinguished group of scholars from the United States and overseas to investigate the roots of internal and inter-state group violence, describe its recent history, and explore a variety of ideas for ameliorating or avoiding such conflict in the near and long term future. Our goal is not only to understand the violence, but to offer some suggestions and recommendations that might prove useful to people on the continent, and to the international community, in forging a more peaceful future. The conference will be open to all interested persons. Members of the Triangle Institute for Security Studies (composed of academics and professionals with an interest in national and international security affairs), members of the Historic Black Colleges of North Carolina and members of the military, foreign-policy, and Africa-interested policy communities in Washington D.C. are especially welcome.

Format: The conference will begin with an address by our plenary speaker who will provide a general but sophisticated introduction to Africa, stressing its diversity, and outlining broadly the history of recent and current conflicts. Our four panelists on Friday afternoon will offer their insights into the roots of conflict in Africa. On Saturday morning, the theories advanced by these speakers and alternative explanations of conflict will be more fully explored in six break out sessions devoted to the examination of particular regions within Africa. At the end of the morning a rapporteur from each group will give a brief report of the findings of his/her group to the whole assembly and then the floor will be opened to general debate. Saturday afternoon will be devoted to a discussion of conflict resolution in Africa.

Participants

Plenary Speaker: Ali Mazrui,

Born in Kenya, and with a D.Phil. (1966) from Oxford University, Dr. Mazrui is Albert Schweitzer Chair of Africana Studies at SUNY Binghamton. A writer of both fiction and non-fiction, Dr. Mazrui has lectured in more than twenty countries since 1964 and has been the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace Fellowship, Stanford University, 1973-74, and the Rockefeller Foundation fellowship in the united States, 1960-61. His most recent works are Cultural Forces in World Politics (1990) and The Power of Babel, a work on the triple heritage (specifically linguistic) of Africans.

Sesssion on Roots of Conflict:Anthony Clayton A distinguished British historian of Modern Africa with a doctorate from St. Andrews, Scotland (1951), Dr. Clayton was Senior Lecturer at the Royal Military Academy in Sandhurst, U.K. (1965-1994). He has written extensively on African history. His books include The British Empire as a Superpower, 1919-1939, Counter-insurgency in Kenya: A Study of Military Operations Against Mau Mau, France, Soldiers, and Africa and The Wars of French Decolonization. His talk will be based on his forthcoming book, Frontiersmen: Warfare in Africa since 1950 in which he argues that violence in Africa is linked to the search for lebensraum.

Julius Nyang'oro Educated in Africa (B.A. Dar Es Salaam) and the United States (Ph.D. Miami University and J.D. Duke University), Dr. Julius Nyang'oro is Chair of the Curriculum in African and Afro -American Studies at UNC-Chapel Hill. A political economist deeply concerned with democratization, corporatism, and development in Africa, he is the author, among other works of Development and Dependency: A Theoretical Critique and an African Case Study and The State and Capitalist Development in Africa: Declining Political Economies. He will discuss the economic context of violence in contemporary Africa.

René Lemarchand René Lemarchand is Professor Emeritus at the University of Florida at Gainesville. A distinguished, French-born political scientist, he holds a Ph.D. from UCLA (1963). A specialist on former Belgian Africa, Dr. Lemarchand has written numbers of works in both French and English, including Political Awakening in the Congo: The Politics of Fragmentation, and Rwanda and Burundi (1970). He has an especial interest in genocide studies and refugee movements; his latest work dealing with this issues is Burundi: Ethnic Conflict and Genocide (1995). He has just returned from service as consultant to USAID in Accra, Ghana. He will discuss the role played by ethnicity (and the myth of ethnicity) in the Great Lakes conflict.

Pearl Robinson Pearl T. Robinson, Director of International Studies, Tufts University is a well-known political scientist and Africanist whose teaching and research straddle the fields of comparative politics and international politics. Her published works include an article on "Democratization: Understanding the Relationship between Regime Change and the Culture of Politics," and an edited work, Transformation and Resiliency in Africa: As Seen By Afro-American Scholars. She has just returned from a year at Makerere University in Kampala. She is particularly interested in the politics of culture in Africa (a concept she has developed and propagated) and in her presentation will discuss how democratization sometimes leads to violent outcomes.

Session on Conflict Resolution.Claude Emerson Welch Claude Welch is SUNY Distinguished Service Professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo and Co-Director of its Human Rights Center. He holds degrees from Harvard (AB) and Oxford ( Ph.D.). His publications have focused on Africa, human rights, and the political roles of armed forces. Major books on Africa include Human Rights and Development in Africa (1984), Civilian Control of the Military(1976), Military Role and Rule (1974), and Soldier and State in Africa (1970). His talk will focus on the controversial role played by NGOs, a topic treated in his highly acclaimed recent work, Protecting Human Rights in Africa: Roles and Strategies of Non-governmental Organizations (1995).

Pauline Baker Pauline H. Baker (Ph.D. in political science from UCLA) is President of the Fund for Peace in Washington, DC and also teaches at Georgetown University. She taught at the University of Lagos, Nigeria for several years and later worked as a professional staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations committee, and as staff director of the African Affairs subcommittee. She has done considerable writing and research on conflict resolution. Her books include Urbanization and Political Change: The Politics of Lagos, 1917-1967 and The United States and South Africa: the Reagan years and the edited works, African Armies, Evolution and Capabilitie and South Africa and the World Economy in the 1990's. At the conference, she will discuss her latest research into early warning and policy assessment for failing states.

Bona Malwal Currently a fellow at St. Antony's College Oxford, Bona Malwal brings to the conference extensive first hand experience of politics in the Sudan. A founder of the Southern Front Party of Southern Sudan, and its first secretary general, he rose to become Minister of Culture and Information, a position he held for over seven years. In 1977 he became a member of the Political Bureau of the Sudan Socialist Union. Bona Malwal is the author of People and Power in Sudan: The Struggle for National Stability and The Sudan: A Second Challenge to Nationhood. Dr. Malwal, who has been active in recent negotiations in the Sudan, will discuss his practical experience in conflict resolution.

Richard Joseph Dr. Richard Joseph (Ph.D. Oxford 1973) is the Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Political Science at Emory University. Formerly the head of the Africa section at the Carter Center, he is the author, among other works of Democracy and prebendal politics in Nigeria: The Rise and Fall of the Second Republic. Dr. Joseph is concerned with democratization and governance, and conflict resolution. He will serve as moderator and discussion leader for our final session on conflict resolution.

A check in the amount of $20 or $35 made out to the Triangle Institute for Security Studies. Your name, address, phone number and, if you have one, an email address. A list indicating, in order of preference, the case-study sessions you would like to attend.

There are currently places for 100 persons besides the thirty participants. Places will be allocated on a first come, first served basis. If demand is sufficient, we will attempt to expand the conference to meet the demand.